Just Like Heaven
by like spun glass
Summary: HikaruKaoru. The best things in life are for free. The twins give domesticity and the commoner life a shot.


**Title**: Just Like Heaven  
**Pairing**: Hikaru/Kaoru  
**Rating**: R for vague sexuality  
**Summary**: **Future**!fic. The best things in life are for free. The twins give domesticity and the _commoner_ life a shot.

From the looks of things, there could be a storm headed their way.

They are in the backyard tending to the flowerbeds and the wind is starting to pick up. Hikaru is on his knees on the dirt, his fingers burrowed deep into the soil, and Kaoru thinks, very briefly, that he has never seen him like this before: his skin smelling of earth and sweat, his boots caked in mud starting to crust.

Kaoru peels of his gloves carefully and cranes his neck at the sky. "Do you think it's going to rain soon?" He asks. The window to the kitchen is starting to rattle. Hikaru brushes the dirt from his knees and wipes his cheek with the back of his arm, streaking it with grime. "I don't know," He says and stands. "Maybe there's a storm coming. What did it say on the radio?"

Kaoru shrugs. "I didn't listen." And he picks up his gloves and the little shovel too and deposits them into an empty bucket. Hikaru goes back to work on the flower bed, messy with his hands and clumsy with the dirt that is slowly piling up around the roots. Kaoru thinks of where those hands have been, the places they have touched, and sometimes he wonders if Hikaru thinks of his hands the same way too.

They're slender, almost bony. Somewhere along the way he has picked up the habit of chewing on their edges. Nervous energy. He thinks they've gone calloused because of housework but Hikaru keeps telling him they're still soft and that three days of living a commoner's life cannot possibly make them calloused in any way. Hikaru's hands are deft, quick, his grasp firm but gentle. In many ways, like Kaoru's, in many ways not.

"Ne, Hikaru." Kaoru begins quietly. The wind is seeping through his clothes, squeezing through layers of fabric and making his skin prickle. "Do you ever think okaasan will want us back anymore?"

Hikaru's movements gradually slow down. He is flattening a mound of soil with his fingers when the ground becomes darker. It's starting to rain, but slowly. "Don't think about it, Kaoru." Hikaru says. He's on his feet again and the streak of grime is still there. Kaoru wants to brush it off with his fingers, feel Hikaru's skin flutter under his touch, but he is not sure how Hikaru will feel. His head is tilted and he is grinning again, that fake grin that Kaoru knows is used for indulging him.

"We're going to be okay, Kaoru." Hikaru says. His smile is flickering and difficult to look at. "I'm sure we'll manage somehow. Haruhi was a commoner all her life and look at how well she turned out!"

Kaoru doesn't say that it is not the same. He doesn't say that they're used to having things handed out to them. He doesn't say that money has never been one of their problems before.

The rain is starting to fall heavy. Portions of Hikaru's shirt are starting to get wet. Kaoru runs back into the house and fetches the laundry basket and barefoot, he runs to grab the sheets they have left to dry this morning.

"What are you doing just standing there Hikaru?" he yells over his shoulder. His hands are frantically pulling at a bed sheet, stuffing it into the basket and he does the same thing again to the next. 

Hikaru smiles and he says, dramatic, "I'm coming, I'm coming!"

And the urge to smirk is strong, it tugs at the corner of Hikaru's lips — the way Kaoru's brows are furrowed as he carries on a task that is so domestic and so _commoner_. It's actually pretty funny.

"What're you laughing at?" Kaoru asks, only sounding irritated. The rain comes down harder and Hikaru shakes his head. His boots are soaked in a puddle.

"Nothing, I was laughing at nothing." And he helps Kaoru for once and they run back inside.

Kaoru shuts the door behind them with a firm thud. He sets the basket down and collapses on the couch. He sighs loudly. "I'm all wet now," he says and hates how it comes out as a whine. But Hikaru's not listening. His posture is tilted. His arms are crossed. The windows are pretty and huge in the living room and they remind Kaoru of the floor-to-ceiling ones they used to have back home.

"The rain's pretty heavy," Hikaru says conversationally and looks out.

Kaoru trains his gaze outside and he thinks of the flowerbeds they'd just tended. "Yeah," he says, quiet. The pitter patter of rain soothes him. It's nice when you actually pay attention. Maybe that's what made commoners different. _Maybe_. Maybe not.

"Will you help me fold the sheets?"

Hikaru turns to him. "What?"

"Well, they're not going fold themselves." Kaoru says and he stands to pick one up from the basket.

Hikaru laughs, loud, like he, or _they_, used to in high school. It reminds Kaoru that they haven't changed at all, only grown older, and he feels guilty but it is only fleeting guilt on how he has always feared change.

"Ne, Hikaru, will you help me or not?" He's folding the sheet carefully like he's watched their maids do, and he goes to pick up another one from the basket and so on.

"Sure, I'll help you." Hikaru says but he sounds irreverent. There is a glint in his eye that is vaguely familiar. And somehow Kaoru just _knows_. Hikaru is up to mischief again.

"_Hikaru_," Kaoru says in a whine and he means, _there is no time for this_. He's still folding sheets, but Hikaru pulls out his own from the basket, still a little damp from the rain, and wraps it around him like a cocoon from behind.

"Gotcha," Hikaru says and grins, mouth next to Kaoru's ear. His chest is warm, his shirt still a little wet from the rain. "Now you can't get away, can you?"

"No, I don't think I can," Kaoru says dryly and turns. "_Hikaru_," But he feels oddly warm despite being in damp clothes. And when Hikaru pushes him back onto the couch, he feels even warmer, his shirt gone and Hikaru's hands pressing insistently on his skin.

Hikaru lifts the sheets and crawls under them. Some time ago he has taken off his shirt, too. Kaoru's heart swells and his pants are suddenly undone, Hikaru's mouth following the path his fingers have taken, hot and wet and sly.

He rests his cheek against Kaoru's forehead and they rock together slowly, hips and soft kisses, and it still makes Kaoru's toes curl. Hikaru lifts his knee and Kaoru's face heats, his chest swelling, bursting and Hikaru kisses him once more and he still feels warm despite the rain outside.

"I think maybe we should give this commoner life a shot," Hikaru says later when they are wrapped around each other under the sheets. Lying there sloppy on the couch, it makes Kaoru feel _so_ childish. But it feels good, like being alive for the first time. The sheets smell different, like a commoner's would probably, but they are soft and oddly comfortable like Hikaru's thumbnail scratching his hip.

"It's not so bad, is it Kaoru?"

Kaoru shrugs, reaches out to wipe the grime off his cheek. "It's not." he says. Hikaru's nose is pressed against his temple. "But we're going to have to give up a lot of things."

Hikaru sighs, mournful and a kiss dabbles Kaoru's ear though it is brief. "Like sex?" He teases. Kaoru snickers, wraps his leg around Hikaru so his knee slides precisely between his legs.

"Maybe, if that will get us _somewhere_."

"Nah, I doubt it." Hikaru says, and then after, "I like these sheets. They smell nice." He presses his face against the papery fabric but doesn't say, _they smell like you_.

"Really?"

"Yeah," Hikaru says, quiet, and kisses him. "I think you should do the laundry more often."


End file.
